by Charly Mann

Addendum 2-4-2010: Frank Rinaldi apparently died in poverty. His estate included the old house he lived in on Byrneside Avenue (mortgaged in 2007) and personal property with an estimated value of $20,000 At one point, he was reputedly worth $5 million. He probably only had a very small Social Security check, because he had not worked most of his life, and the rent from his tenants. The exact cause of Rinaldi's death has not been given.

NOTE: This article was written on November 12th, 2009, and posted at noon the next day. By strange coincidence Frank Rinaldi was discovered dead at his home in Waterbury, Connecticut at about the same time the article was published.

11-24-2009: The following is additional evidence about Frank Rinaldi and the murder that was not included in my original article.

As my article brings up Frank Rinaldi bought a double indemnity policy on his wife that was worth $40,000 and one on himself for $10,000.

The new facts are these. Frank stopped paying on his policy four months before the murder, and then cancelled the policy on himself and was refunded all the money he had already paid on it.

At the same time, Frank, who had little money of his own, borrowed $720 from the Bank of Chapel Hill to pay the premium on Lucille’s policy through the end of December. (She was murdered on December 24th).

Even before Frank cancelled his own policy one might wonder why he would only want Lucille and his child to have $10,000 if he was to have died accidently, and he was going to get $40,000 if his pregnant wife, who was two years younger than him, was to die this way.

Since this article was published I have received much more information on this crime. Almost all of it further incriminates Rinaldi. Because others think it important, I have now included the fact that Rinaldi went shopping in Durham before he did his shopping on Franklin Street.  He was however on Franklin Street  and very near his home within the time his wife was murdered there.
 

On Christmas eve 1963, Chapel Hill was almost like a ghost town. UNC students had left for their holiday break more than a week earlier, and many of the town's residents were away visiting relatives. At about 10 AM that morning the most brutal murder in Chapel Hill history occurred. In a small apartment at 105 North Street, about a block from the police station, a woman who was five months pregnant had a sock forcibly stuffed into her mouth and was hit violently across her skull twice with a large flashlight. The killer then took a small seat pillow and forced it hard against her face until she showed no signs of life. The woman was not sexually assaulted and the apartment was not robbed. The murder probably took less than five minutes.

The woman's name was Lucille Regina Rinaldi. She had been married less than five months to a part-time English instructor named Frank Joseph Rinaldi who was working on a PhD in English at UNC. Later that day he would be charged with first degree murder and put in jail. Over the course of the next two years there would be two murder trials in the case. In the first Frank Rinaldi was convicted of murder and sent to Central Prison in Raleigh. In the second Rinaldi was found innocent.

Lucille Begg in 1959. On July 31,1963 she married Frank Rinaldi.

I am convinced that Frank Rinaldi killed his wife and will explain why I believe he is guilty and why he was acquitted of the murder in the second trial.

The following facts convince me Frank Rinaldi was responsible for the murder of his wife:

1. Lucille Begg and Frank Rinaldi were married on July 31, 1963 in Waterbury Connecticut. Soon after the marriage there was some kind of problem, and Frank returned to Chapel Hill where he was working on his PhD.

2. Throughout August of 1963 there are letters and phone calls between Frank and Lucille. He learns she is pregnant, and she decides to attempt to reconcile with Frank by moving to Chapel Hill. Lucille arrives in Chapel Hill on September 2 and is interviewed and hired as a teacher at the newly opened Guy B. Phillips junior high school on Estes Drive. She shows up for the first day of school on September 8th, and leaves Chapel Hill suddenly the next day without notifying the school. The Chapel Hill School superintendent finally tracks her down to her family's home in Waterbury, Connecticut. She said she has left because of domestic difficulties.

3. It needs to be stated that Frank Rinaldi was gay. This in no way this is meant to cloud his character or imply that a gay man is more capable of murdering his wife than a straight man. The relevance here is twofold. First, most would agree that a marriage between a heterosexual woman and a homosexual man is full of challenges, and in this case Lucille seemed to be unaware or in denial about Frank's sexual orientation. More significantly though marriages generally depend on fidelity between the partners, and Frank was involved with at least one man during the time of their brief marriage.

4. Frank bought a $40,000 double indemnity life insurance policy on Lucille from his close companion John Sipp shortly before she was murdered. Such a policy pays this amount if Lucille were to die accidently, which includes being murdered. In today's terms this is equivalent to about $300,000.

This is suspicious for several reasons. While he did buy a policy for himself, it was for only $10,000 even though he was two years older and a male. He had virtually no income at this time, as he was only a part time instructor, and had to pay rent, tuition, as well as food and clothing costs from his small salary. It would be more logical that if he had extra money he would have wanted to be saving it for the cost of raising his soon to be born child. Rarely do couples take out life insurance policies on one another within five months of getting married, especially if they are having serious marital problems and are not living together, and have no stated plans to do so in the future.

Frank Joseph Rinaldi, convicted, acquitted, and still the only suspect in the killing of his wife in Chapel Hill on December 24, 1963 

5. According to sworn testimony by local handyman Alfred Foushee, Rinaldi offered him $500 to kill his wife when she came to visit over Christmas. When Foushee refused, he asked if he could find someone else to kill her for $500. Rinaldi also told him it did not matter how his wife was killed. He said raping, strangling, choking, or anything else was all right with him.

On the morning of the murder Foushee testified he ran into Frank Rinaldi at the Eastgate Hardware store and Rinaldi said to him, "It's all over Al, I did it."

6. Police found blood matching Rinaldi's wife's type on the shirt and pants Frank Rinaldi wore on the day of the murder. They also found in the Rinaldi house a large flashlight that had been bent at the handle and a pillow with blood stains on it.

7. Lucille Rinaldi began receiving friendly letters and phone calls from Frank shortly after he had taken out the double indemnity policy on her. In them he encouraged her come for a visit over Christmas to try to fix their problems. Frank was also quite cordial to Lucille during the last three days she was alive, but this is likely because he a planed to kill her on the 24th and did not want her to leave before then.

8. On Christmas Eve morning Frank and his long-time companion John Sipp, who he had bought the double indemnity insurance policy from, went out Christmas Shopping. Frank seemed to want to establish an alibi for himself as he visited 17 stores in Durham and Chapel Hill between about 9:30 AM and 1:00 PM. The best estimate by the coroner for the time of death was between 10:00 and noon.

The problem with this alibi is that during this time Sipp and other eyewitness place them downtown on Franklin Street during the time of the murder. Depending on where they parked, they were within 200 to 400 feet of the Rinaldi residence on North Street between 11:00 and noon.  In less than ten minutes Rinaldi could have slipped into his apartment grabbed his flashlight and a sock. The murder itself took just a few minutes - two blows to Lucille's head with the flashlight while a sock was stuffed in her mouth. Then a pillow was placed tightly to her face for a couple of minutes to make sure she was dead. Frank could have easily gone to the house, killed Lucille, and been back on Franklin Street within ten minutes or less. In those days one often got to North Street by walking through a yard or driveway on Rosemary Street directly into an adjoining North Street property.

In 1963 one would often park on Rosemary Street when shopping downtown. You could also easily walk through any lot on Rosemary to get to a house on North Steet. I recently walked from the location of Rinaldi's apartment to the Chapel Hill Post Office in 74 seconds. In 1963 there was less traffic on Rosemary and fewer other obstacles which would probably make it quicker.

It should be remembered there was no robbery or sign of forced entry into the house. The person who did the crime knew what they wanted to do and that was kill Lucille and leave the scene as quickly as possible.

It is possible that John Sipp, who was Rinaldi's closest friend and the person who sold Frank the life insurance policy, could have known about Frank's intention. Frank certainly had no problem discussing the murder twice with Alfred Foushee who was only a casual friend. Even if Sipp was not aware of Frank's plan, he is Frank's main alibi witness for the time the murder was committed. While they were downtown there is no evidence that John and Frank were always together. For example, John spent time in Roses 5 & 10 Cent Store talking to an employee who did not recall Frank being around the store the entire time. Roses was located almost directly in line with Rinaldi house. It also had a back door entrance (like several other stores in those days), where one could have gone out and committed the crime and come back in. It is also possible they could have split up for ten or fifteen minutes while shopping and running errands along Franklin Street.

9. Lucille Rinaldi's family believed that Frank was the killer. They were more aware than anyone else of the serious problems that prevented Frank and Lucille from living together almost their entire brief marriage.

10. After Frank Rinaldi was acquitted of the murder in the second trial he expended no time or resources looking for the "real" killer. I recently asked 11 couples ranging in age from their 20s to late 40s how they believed they would react if they were falsely accused of murdering their spouse and later acquitted. All 22 people said essentially the same thing: they would make it their life's work to help find the killer.

11. Why was Frank Rinaldi spending Christmas Eve morning and early afternoon with his close companion John Sipp shopping instead of with his wife who he had not seen in months, and with whom he was supposed to be working on improving the problems in their relationship? Frank Rinaldi lived less than a half a block from Franklin Street which contained the widest array of stores in North Carolina if he needed to go Christmas shopping. There were no malls then in the state. Franklin Street then had several great jewelry stores, at least three gift shops, a toy store, the two best record stores in the state, more than half a dozen women's clothing stores and twice that number of men's clothing stores. There was no better place to Christmas shop south of New York City or west of Dallas than downtown Chapel Hill. Frank certainly did not need transportation or a friend to Christmas shop with.

12. If Frank Rinaldi is innocent then for the only time I can discover in Chapel Hill history someone randomly walked into a small student apartment with the intent of killing in broad daylight someone they did not know. They had no other motive, and strangely there was never a similar crime in Chapel Hill history.

Statistics from the National Coalition Against Domestic Violence show that nine out of ten women who are murdered knew their killer, and that it is practically unheard of for a woman to be murdered alone in her home in broad daylight by a stranger.

Why then was Frank Rinaldi acquitted in his second trial of murder?

There are a combination of facts that played to Frank Rinaldi's advantage in being acquitted of murder that I will now detail.

1. The Rinaldi murder was probably the first cold blooded killing in Chapel Hill's history. The Rachel Crook killing which took place twelve years earlier actually occurred close to Hillsborough and the Chapel Hill Police Department played only a small role in its investigation. Chapel Hill had a very small police department and was a fairly crime-free community in 1963. Many people left their house unlocked, as well as their cars even when they parked downstairs. I cannot even find a case of a significant robbery or armed robbery before this.

The Chapel Hill Police Department had no expertise in handling a murder investigation, and made several mistakes that contributed to Rinaldi's acquittal. The primary mistake was taking crucial evidence without a proper warrant. This included the blood stained shirt and pants Frank was wearing at the time of the murder, the dented flashlight in the house that was probably the murder weapon, as well as the blood stained pillow. All of this crucial evidence had to be returned to Rinaldi and was ruled inadmissible for evidence in the second trial.

Frank Rinaldi is 80 years old today. His wife, Lucille, has been dead for 46 years. 

2. Neither Chapel Hill nor Orange County had a District Attorney for prosecuting serious crimes. They were assigned District Solicitor Thomas D Cooper from Burlington to handle the case. Cooper was well over his head as the prosecutor of a murder case like this. His primary strategy in the trial came from his ultra conservative religious views that saw homosexuality as evil. Cooper's main theory in the case was that Rinaldi had to be the murderer because he was a homosexual. Time after time in the trial he said the motive for the killing was "the kind of man he was." Cooper seemed more like he was on a religious crusade to expose the shame of homosexuality, and delighted in calling witnesses that could corroborate Rinaldi was gay. He did very little to show Rinaldi's motive, evidence, and opportunity to commit the murder.

I believe the fact that Rinaldi was gay was relevant only to the extent that it might indicate a fundamental problem in the marriage. On the other hand I know that it is possible for a homosexual and an heterosexual to have a reasonably functional relationship. The problem here is not Rinaldi's sexual orientation, but that there was evidence of several relationships with men during the time he was supposed to be faithful to his wife.

In the first trial Rinaldi's chief attorney Barry Winston tried to prevent Cooper from harping on the homosexuality of his client, but the presiding Judge seemed as conservative at Cooper and let it all in. In his closing arguments to the jury, Rinaldi's sexual orientation and lifestyle were almost exclusively what he talked about, and not the array of incriminating facts in the case. In that speech, he kept mentioning how Rinaldi called other men "baby", repeating the phrase more than a dozen times. He asked the jury several times to consider, "What kind of man calls another man, 'baby'?"

After Rinaldi was convicted in the first trial his attorney appealed on the grounds that Cooper had made the theme of his case the belief that homosexuality made a person prone to murder. The State Supreme Court agreed and overturned the conviction. They also ruled that much of the incriminating evidence seized by police was taken improperly and could not be introduced in the second trial.

By the time of the second trial, Cooper had lost his ability to attack Rinaldi's homosexuality and seemed dispirited. He also could not use the best evidence the police had obtained, and did not have the talent to demonstrate the mountain of circumstantial evidence against Rinaldi.

3. Frank Rinaldi had the best local attorneys money could buy representing him. Barry Winston and Gordon Battle were two of the most outstanding and brightest criminal defense attorneys in the state. While Thomas Cooper was prosecuting the Rinaldi cases he was at the same time in charge of prosecuting hundreds of people being arrested on an almost daily basis in sit-ins that were designed to end segregation in many hotels and restaurants in Chapel Hill. These civil rights arrests totally overloaded the Chapel Hill and Orange County judicial system. The jails in Chapel Hill and Hillsborough were overflowing, and special sessions of the Superior Court were held on a regular basis for more than a year to take care of the backlog of cases. Chapel Hill's civil rights demonstrations and acts of civil disobedience were then a focal point in the state and national print and television media. Chapel Hill's already small police force was stretched to the limit and was confronting two extreme and unusual types of criminal activity - murder in the first degree and civil rights arrests. Under these circumstances it is no wonder that the investigation and prosecution of Rinaldi was handled sloppily. Never before or since have the Chapel Hill police and local judicial system been so overwhelmed.

Writer's Note: I had just turned 14 at the time of the Rinaldi murder. I was an avid Hardy Boys fan and had just started doing a small weekly Chapel Hill newspaper with a circulation of between two and five copies. I was also a Chapel Hill Weekly newspaper boy. The Rinaldi case was of particular interest to me from the start and I kept every article that was related to it. This may have been partly due to the fact that the murder occurred in the apartment my parents lived in when I was born and I spent the first nine months of my life in.

Initially I hoped I would uncover a great scoop for my little paper that would exonerate Frank Rinaldi who had been charged with the murder from the start. I tried methodically to piece together the evidence as it was reported. I also had other sources for information. I would go down to the Chapel Hill Newspaper's offices once or twice a month to pick up my papers for delivery, and ask whoever was there what the latest was on the case. I also was fortunate to have several adult friends who were part of the then heavily closeted homosexual community in Chapel Hill. These men were all friends of my mother, and one became my Godfather. I spent a lot of time with him the year after the murder, and was always surprised how much he knew about all the men who were friends with Rinaldi. While what he told me is all hearsay, it did begin raising my suspicions about Rinaldi. I was also actively involved as a civil rights demonstrator in Chapel Hill in 1963 and 1964, and got on well with a couple of police officers who were always around to protect us from angry segregationists or arrest us if we were involved in an act of civil disobedience. On at least two occasions one of these officers was forthcoming with me on his information on the Rinaldi case. Over the years I have continued to talk to people about the case, including several former Chapel Hill police officers , local attorneys,  judges, who have all offered me more information. I have tried in this piece to use only facts that were reported by the official media, or that I deduced from that evidence. Some of this information is from notes I took from WCHL broadcasts in 1963 and 1964.

by Charly Mann

Friday July 30th 1965 was a beautiful day to be alive in Chapel Hill. At 12:30 that afternoon the skies were clear, and it was 77; mild for mid-summer, and an attractive twenty-one year old coed named Suellen Evans was walking back to her room at Cobb dormitory. She was enrolled in summer school and had attended classes that morning in education and sociology. Like many other coeds she felt safe walking through the Arboretum in the middle of day to get to the nearby cluster of women dorms. Suellen had a beautiful voice and loved to sing. The most popular song among UNC students that week was the Four Tops song “I Can’t Help Myself” which she loved to sing along with.

Suellen Evans

As Suellen was about to complete her journey through the Arboretum a man suddenly grabbed her, and holding a five-inch knife in his hand tried to rape her near the exit on Raleigh Street across from McIver dormitory. Suellen screamed for help and fought off her assailant with all her might. As they struggled the man first stabbed her in the neck, and then in the chest right through her heart. The man then fled as two groups of women ran up to the scene after hearing Suellen’s cries for help. Suellen said to the women “he tried to rape me … I believe I’m going to faint”. Those were her last words.

Police search for clues at crime scene in Arboretum

Suellen Evans was loved by all her knew her. Her longtime friend and roommate at UNC that summer, Caroline Kay Seawell, described her as the most wonderful person she ever knew. More than 800 people attended her funeral in her hometown of Mooresville.

Suellen Evans was the first UNC student to be murdered in cold-blood, and the first reported even attempted rape victim, and it all happened in broad daylight in an area where hundreds of students walked, picnicked, sunbathed, or studied everyday.

The murder was commited in the Arboretum near the exit across from McIver Dormitory

Chapel Hill was shocked at the crime. More than 200 male UNC students walked shoulder to shoulder through every inch of the five acre Coker Arboretum looking for the long blade knife used in the slaying. Chapel Hill citizens colleted money for a reward fund that grew to $1285.

The University Police, The State Bureau of Investigation, and the Chapel Hill Police force combined to try to find the murderer. The Chapel Hill Board of Alderman even voted an extra $500 for the Police Department for use in their investigation. The first suspect was a black janitor who worked at Phillips Hall, and had been positively identified as coming out of the Arboretum around the time of the murder. After four hours of questioning he was released, primarily because he had no cuts or scratches, and the crime scene and lab tests indicated Suellen had forcibly tried to fight off her assailant.

The best lead was a red headed white man with freckles that two witnesses saw emerge from the Arboretum at the time of the slaying with blood on his hands, shirt, and neck, and get into a 1961 or 62 Rambler parked in front of the Chapel of The Cross in the Sundial parking area which adjoins the arboretum. The man was described as being about 50.

This is my mockup of the August 8, 1965 issue of my newspaper detailing the murder of Suellen Evans

Sadly the Suellen Evans case remains unsolved. I started doing a twice weekly Chapel Hill newspaper for my friends and family when I was fouteen in 1964 called The News of Chapel Hill. For several weeks in 1965 I focused much my coveage on the Evans case. I have always been cerain it was the blood splatteed red-headed man who was the murderer. Eerily his description and age at the time match the same person who I suspect killed Rachel Crook in another brutal crirme fouteen years earlier. See my article on the Crook murder case at: http://www.chapelhillmemories.com/cat/3/59

Could it be that the same man who killed Rachel Crook also killled Suellen Evans and both times escaped justice?

by Charly Mann

Crook's Corner, which is located at 610 West Franklin Street, has been one of Chapel Hill's most acclaimed restaurants since it opened in 1982. It took its name from Rachel Crook who once operated three small businesses in the same location. She had converted a former gas station into a laudromat, a fabric store, and a produce and fish market. Besides running these stores, in 1951, this single, 71 year old woman was also a graduate student at UNC in Economics.

Site of Rachel Crook's business and residence in 1951

Unfortunately, Ms. Crook is best remembered as the victim of a horrible murder. On the night of August 29th, 1951, she was forcibly taken from her small apartment that was attached to her business, to an abandoned road about four miles south of Hillsborough, and there raped and then brutally murdered. The crime took place not far from the site of the New Hope Church. For decades it has been the folklore of Chapel Hill that her murder was unsolved, but I think there is little doubt that her killer was a Burlington bulldozer operator named Hobart Lee.

 
Rachel Crook and the restaurant named in her honor

These are the facts of the case. On the evening of August 29th Rachel was at her business. Around 8:00 PM several people along the sidewalks, and in cars leading from Crook's business, testified they heard a woman screaming from a green pickup truck that was traveling towards Columbia Street, and then down Airport Road in the direction of Hillsborough. The next morning, on August 30th, Highway Patrolman Robert Thomas found her body lying on its back in a pool of caked blood. Her face was so badly battered that it was unrecognizable. The white smock she wore was pulled up over her waist.

The SBI and Orange County Sheriffs quickly made a detailed investigation of the crime. Within a week they had arrested Hobart Lee, then 34, for the murder. The case against him seemed exceptionally convincing, and I will now detail most of the evidence.

1. Tire tracks at the murder scene matched those on Lee's truck. SBI special agent James R. Durham found that the tracks in the road next to where her body was discovered were created by three U.S. Royal recaps and one Seiberling tire. These matched the tires on Lee's truck, and were an unlikely combination to occur on any other vehicle.
2. Several of the Chapel Hill witnesses who had heard a woman screaming said the sounds came from a green truck that matched the description of Lee's.
3. There were other witnesses who confirmed seeing a truck matching Lee's near New Hope Church that evening.
4. There was blood under Ms. Crook's nails indicating she had tried to fight off her attacker. When Lee was arrested he had scratches on his arms and face.
5. Lee had a record of violent assaults and attempted rape on women dating back more than ten years.
6. When Lee was arrested he told Orange County Sheriff Sam Latta that he was so drunk on the evening that the crime took place that he had no recollection of what he did that night.
7. Lee passed through Chapel Hill twice each day on his way from Burlington to Cary where he was working on a road project. His route took him directly by Crook's store.
8. Lee never denied that he assaulted and killed Crook.
9. At the trial, his lawyer never called a single witness to counter the state's evidence or offer an alibi for Lee.
10. A heel mark was found at the scene of the crime that exactly matched one on Lee's shoe.

So why wasn't Lee convicted? First, because the case was not tried in Chapel Hill, but in Hillsborough, at the Orange County Courthouse. The event was like a media circus. The courthouse was freshly painted and given a new floor for the trial. The jury was primarily made up of rural residents with traditional southern Christian roots, a fact that would have a large effect on the outcome of the trial. Second, Lee's lawyer used an ingenious defense under the circumstances. After the prosecution rested its case with more than a dozen witnesses and an array of incriminating evidence, Lee's attorney said he would rest his case and not call a single witness to rebut all the damning evidence or offer an alibi for his client. Instead, he made a closing plea to the jury which he began by saying all the evidence against Lee was "circumstantial," since there was no actual witness to the murder. Then he delivered more of a sermon than a summation, liberally quoting verses from the Bible and making reference to Jesus, finally culminating with a quote from the Old Testament that said it was better to let several guilty men go free than convict one innocent man. His tactics worked. In less than 90 minutes the Jury found Lee innocent, and the man who almost certainly killed Rachel Crook was free.

Orange County Courthouse 1950

Today with DNA testing I believe we could conclusively prove Lee was guilty. This might require exhuming Crook and Lee's bodies. (I suspect Lee is now deceased – he would be 93 today if still alive.) If you are interested in resolving this horrible crime I urge you to contact the Chapel Hill Police, the Orange County Sheriff’s Department, or the North Carolina State Bureau of Investigation to see if they can re-examine the physical evidence using modern forensic methods.

by Charly Mann

The fall of 1961 was a very strange time in Chapel Hill. In those months nine men in town met very unusual deaths, and for the most part the primary media in town – The Chapel Hill Weekly and WCHL - ignored these events. What puzzled me then as a twelve year old boy, and now, is why were so many men dying so young and mostly in such curious situations. I usually heard about these deaths from small pieces in the Durham Morning Herald or The Daily Tar Heel and was always disappointed that the deaths were rarely even mentioned anywhere else.

Henry Owen Jr's death certificate, from possible acute alcholism, September 1961, Chapel Hill, NC

I have now gone through old clippings and articles I saved from this time to give you a sampling of these circumstances. Of the nine deaths, the Chapel Hill coroner classified two as mysteries, four as suicides, one an accident, and two by natural causes. Most of these deaths seemed to me to merit more examination. For example on Saturday September 23, 1961 Harry Paxton Owen, Jr., 23 was found dead in his bed with a bottle of alcohol on his nightstand. The coroner did not perform an autopsy on Owen, but said on the death report that the "immediate cause" of death was "possible acute alcoholism." The next week on October 4th Robert Smith Mauldin, Jr., 33, died in his apartment on Prichard Avenue. Again, no autopsy was performed and this time the death certificate said "immediate cause of death due to natural causes and possible heart attack."

Robert Mauldin's death certificate , death from natural causes, possible heart attack, Chapel Hill, NC

The very day after Mauldin’s death, on October 5th, 1961, the strangest pair of deaths in Chapel Hill's history occurred. Two UNC students living in Cobb dormitory, James Michael Barham, 20, and William Henry Harrison Johnson, Jr., 24, were found dead in the bedroom they shared. For several days only the Tar Heel and the Durham paper reported information on these deaths, but after almost a week on October 10th the Chapel Hill Weekly published the following piece detailing these bizarre deaths.

STRANGE DEATHS IN COBB DORM

One week ago tomorrow, two students were found dead in their beds in Cobb Dormitory. So far, police have been able to establish that they died from cyanide poisoning. They do not know exactly how, or why. The investigation is continuing. This is the story up to the present.

From outward appearances, it is extraordinary that James Michael Barham and William Henry Harrison Johnson Jr. should be drawn together in a University student body of 9,000.

They formed an odd contrast.

Barham was 21, good-looking, with blond, crew-cut hair, a cleft chin, straightforward eyes and a friendly expression, and had been active in extracurricular activities as a high school student in Burlington, 25 miles away. At the University he was vice president of a musical fraternity, played trumpet in the University Band and with a small dance combo made up of the top pop players on campus.

Johnson was 24, three years older than Mike, a graduate student in industrial relations. He, too, had been a pre-medical student, but eye trouble had forced him to switch studies. His eyes were deep-set in a strong, dark face, and he wore dark-rimmed glasses. He was not a joiner, shunned extracurricular activities, rarely smiled, was quiet and retiring, and spoke, as a rule, only when spoken to.

When Barham and Johnson first met is vague, but their association had been definitely established by last spring.

When the spring semester ended, Johnson went to work for the summer as assistant manager of a suburban restaurant in Greensboro. He was highly regarded by his employer in Greensboro. "He was a clean-cut, nice-looking young man," the employer said. "Didn't smoke or drink. He had all the qualifications you'd require in a summer job like that."

After Johnson had been at the restaurant for three weeks, he persuaded his employer to give Barham a job. "He said Barham would be an asset," the employer said. "So we gave him a try. He worked Saturdays and Sundays as cashier." Johnson and Barham lived together in a Greensboro boarding house.

"They were very reserved," the employer recalled. "No horseplay. They were studious and bookish, what you would call academic. They were retiring, not outgoing—introverts."

Barham had dates while he was working in Greensboro, but Johnson apparently never did.

The restaurant owner said he understood that Barham was supposed to have had a date with a girl in Greensboro last Friday. When Barham failed to appear, the girl called Chapel Hill and was told that he was dead.

"Barham was an extremely nice boy, what you might call a mother's boy," the restaurant owner said. "He wanted desperately to do a good job for us. But he did not have the aggressive quality necessary to lead people. He was not forceful."

He recalled that Johnson had a habit of blinking his eyes when he talked to him and "you couldn't tell whether he was listening or not."

"The two boys were extremely fond of each other," the restaurant owner said.

Barham quit his job in Greensboro sometime in August. Johnson continued working at the restaurant up until just before the Univerity's fall semester began in mid-September.

When Barham returned last month to the University to begin his third year as a pre-medical student his plans were well-laid. He had a job as a student adviser in Cobb Dormitory, another job waiting on tables in the Lenoir Hall and a third part-time job picking up and delivering cleaning in the dormitory.

As a dorm adviser he had a room rent-free, with the comparative luxury of only one roommate. A record enrollment of 9,100 students this year had forced the University to assign three students to most of the older dormitory rooms. Barham's roommate had been assigned by University officials, an arbitrary choice.

A few days after classes started in mid-September, Johnson went to unusual lengths to have his room changed so he could live with Barham. He persuaded Barham's original roommate to move out. Barham accepted the change.

As an advisor, Barham was liked by many students in Cobb, one of the largest dormitories on campus and the home of more than four hundred students. Most of the students on Barham's floor were freshmen. They called him Mike. They went to him with their problems and found him friendly, easy-going, always eager to help. He had smile for everyone.

Mike Barham and Bill Johnson, two University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill students who died mysteriously in 1961 at Cobb Dormitory

With the semester still young and life in the dormitory largely impersonal, Johnson was known by only a few students. Those who knew him called him Bill.

Johnson began working again in Lenoir Hall with Barham. This struck some as rather puzzling, since Johnson wore expensive clothes, drove a 1960 car, and always seemed to have plenty of money.

Despite the sharp contrast of personalities, and an apparent lack of mutual interests, as roommates Barham and Johnson were very close. Their beds had matching spreads; a dual-speaker hi-fi phonograph was installed in their room for Barham, the music lover. There was a television set. The window was hung with green plaid draperies.

Unlike most other students, Barham and Johnson kept their rooms as neat as mother could have asked. Everything was in its proper place, just so.

Last Friday morning, October 6, Robert Holt, a Negro janitor at Cobb, entered the room to clean it. Barham and Johnson were still in bed. There was a pillow over Johnson's face and most of Barham's face was covered by the bedclothes. It had been a cool night. Holt swept the floor, all that was usually necessary, and left the room without disturbing the students. It was customary for janitors to sweep while students slept. He thought the two were heavy sleepers.

Later that morning, at 11:45 a telephone call came from the University dining hall to find out why Johnson and Barham had not reported for work. Holt answered the telephone. He buzzed the room, but no one came. Then he went down the hall and knocked on the door. There was no answer.

Holt entered the room and found Johnson and Barham still in their beds, lying just as he had seen them before. He peered around he edge of the bedclothes at Barham's face. There was a trace of foam at the mouth and blood at the nose. The eyes were slitted. Holt raced back to the phone and dialed the police.

Outside it was a beautiful autumn day. The sun shone warmly on the student parking lot and tennis courts behind Cobb. Across the street from the dormitory, the trees surrounding the University's outdoor theater were just on the turn from green to gold. A bell sounded across the campus, tolling the end of a class period. Students appeared, coming from classes, going to eat lunch at the Monogram Club beside Cobb. There was talk of the UNC-Clemson football game scheduled the next day.

The police arrived at Cobb, took one look in number 201, and detailed students to guard hall doors and stairways. Campus policemen arrived and supplemented the guard. The campus security officer came, and a County deputy sheriff. The coroner was called. Students who lived on the hall were asked to stay in their rooms or out of the building. While crowds of curious undergraduates clustered outside the dormitory and at the ends of Cobb's corridors and talked in muted tones, Barham and Johnson lay dead in their beds. They were lying on their backs, wearing pajamas.

Before the coroner arrived the questioning began. One student was interviewed in Johnson's and Barham's room. Another student's room was commandeered as a "waiting room" for passers-bys. Newsmen were either hustled away from the stairways or shuffled hurriedly into the "waiting room." The janitor was questioned. The police and the campus security officer roamed the second floor, searching for students who could shed some light, any light, on the deaths.

Later, after permission had been given to move the blanket-shrouded bodies, students ran interference in front of the bearers, waving their hands in front of photographers' cameras. Cobb Dormitory buzzed with speculation.

Last Friday, the police learned only one thing for certain: Barham and Johnson were dead. This week, they were still trying to find the answer to two questions: exactly how and why. They were turning out to be nagging questions, leading up a series of blind alleys.

Days of questioning students ed in a sketchy, often contradictory pattern of Barham's activities up until about twelve hours before the bodies were discovered.
Barham had reportedly conducted a meeting of his musical fraternity the night before, and was also reported seen in a Chapel Hill pool room at about the same time. Johnson's whereabouts at that time could not be established.

At 9:30 Thursday night a freshman went to 201 Cobb Dorm to pick up his dry cleaning from Barham. Barham and Johnson were in the room. The freshman was given his clothes by Barham, who was cheerful and smiling. The freshman noticed nothing unusual.

An hour and a half later Barham lurched from the room and staggered down the hallway to the bathroom. Several students were there washing. They heard Barham retching. Finally he spit out a small blob of mucous. Then he collapsed backward, curling up on the floor. One student rushed to help. Barham was having convulsions. His eyes were slitted. He appeared to have lost consciousness and was unresponsive.

The student ran out of the bathroom and down the hall and called Johnson. Before he reached the room, Johnson came out.

"Barham's sick," the student said. "Is he drunk?"

"He doesn't drink," Johnson said.

Johnson followed the student into the bathroom and stood astride Barham and tried to lift him. Then the student told Johnson to get out of the way and, with another student, helped Barham up. Johnson seemed to be annoyed. They carried Barham back to his room, with Johnson walking along holding Barham's arm, but making no effort to help carry his roommate. Going down the hall, Johnson muttered that his roommate was drunk again, contradicting what he had said minutes before.

The two students placed Barham on his bed, on top of the covers. His eyes were still slitted. The convulsions had ceased, but his breathing was labored. There was no odor of alcohol. He still seemed to be unconscious.

One student suggested calling an ambulance. Johnson did not appear to be concerned.

"If he doesn't snap out of it, I'll call a doctor myself," he said, then ushered the two students out of the room as quickly as possible.

When the door closed it was about 11:15. The bodies were discovered a little less than 12 hours later. Neither Barham nor Johnson were reported seen again alive.
News of the two deaths spread quickly, received first with shock, then swelling curiosity.

"This is a terrible tragedy," said Chancellor William B. Aycock. The University Band was reported to be reluctant to play at the football game the next day with Barham missing from the ranks. And the football players, who gave a listless performance in losing to Clemson, were said to have been affected by the news.
There were several public demands for the full facts of the case.

An autopsy ordered by the coroner disclosed that both had died from cyanide poisoning. But most of the other facts uncovered by pathologists and police turned out to be negative.

An examination of milkshake cups found in the room showed no trace of cyanide. Tests on fruit, cookies, and a jar of peanut butter in the room also failed to turn up any trace of cyanide. There was no evidence as to where the cyanide had been obtained or how it had been administered. It is a common chemical, easily obtained, easily disguised in taste. In sufficient quantity it causes death quickly and without marked symptoms. In smaller quantity it can cause death more slowly, with dizziness, labored breathing, convulsions, and coma.

Two days after the bodies were discovered, Ralph Sargeant, a student from Plainfield, New Jersey., was arrested on a charge of illegal dispensing of drugs. In his possession were eight mercuric cyanide pills. He had given a ninth pill to a fellow student with a note which said, "Save this. It may be your best friend on the way out."
Sargeant said he had gotten the pills from a Plainfield dental office where he had worked during the summer. He was relieved of the deadly pills and sent to the University hospital for observation. Officers said Sargeant's cyanide had no connection with the two deaths.

"We are pretty certain that it was not mercuric cyanide that killed them," said Chapel Hill Police Chief William Blake. "We don't think anyone's going around poisoning people."

One student questioned by police said Johnson had asked him about two weeks previously where he could get some "quick-acting poison." The student said he advised Johnson not to use cyanide because of its great danger.

The University Medical and Pharmacy Schools, chemistry labs, and Chapel Hill druggists and merchants were checked in an effort to find the source of the cyanide. Chief Blake said the chances of success were small.

"It's baffling," he said. "It looks almost impossible to arrive at any definite conclusions. I'm just hoping we'll be able to have enough evidence to prove what happened. It was either murder-suicide, double murder, or a suicide pact." He ruled out the possibility of accidental deaths.

The police also ruled out any connection between the death of Barham and Johnson and an unusual death discovered in town two days earlier. Robert Smith Mauldin, 33, an X-ray technician at the University Dental School, was found in his apartment sitting in a chair facing a television set, which was still on, with a magazine in his hand. A dog was wandering around the room. He had been dead about thirty-six hours when discovered. Death was ruled to be by natural causes. The specific cause was not announced and an autopsy was not performed.

Now the police are working on a theory of murder-suicide.

"We are close to a solution," Chief Blake said yesterday, "based on circumstantial evidence rather than on natural facts or an eyewitness. There are strong indications it was murder-suicide."

The police are investigating the possibility that cyanide was sprinkled on crackers and then covered with peanut butter.

Faint smears on Barham's sheet are being analyzed for traces of cyanide. An autopsy report on the students' vital organs also is pending. It has been a frustrating investigation for the police.

"What troubles me," said one officer, "is that we could carry this investigation on till doomsday and never come up with cold facts that would say, 'This is it. This is the way it happened and why it happened.”

From the October 10th 1961 Chapel Hill Weekly

To this day, the cause of these deaths remain a mystery. For the past 40 years, the Phi Mu Alpha Sinfonia fraternity at the University of North Carolina has awarded the James Michael Barham Memorial Scholarship in music in Barham's memory.

by Charly Mann

For more than twenty-five years I have tried to make sense of the death of my childhood friend and neighbor Craig Newman at the hands of his father Dr. William S. Newman. Dr. Newman was probably the most talented and knowledgeable musician ever to live in Chapel Hill. Craig was two years younger than me, born in 1952, and the sweetest child in the Greenwood neighborhood.

Dr. Newman was born on April 6, 1912 in Cleveland, Ohio, and was a first cousin of the actor Paul Newman, who was also from Cleveland. He showed remarkable talent from an early age as a pianist, scholar, and automotive engineer. By the time he was 23, in 1935, he had received a PhD in music, and had published the first of a long line of critically acclaimed books on classical music. He was also regularly giving piano recitals around the world, often as the featured soloist of major orchestras. Newman loved motorcycles and several times traveled the country on the back of his Harley Davidson during his concert tours. Remarkably, at the same time he was doing all this touring, he also held teaching positions at both Julliard and Columbia University. During World War II Bill, as he preferred to be called, worked in Army Intelligence rising to the rank of major by the end of the war.

Dr. William Stein Newman lecturing in his music class at UNC Chapel Hill 

Shortly after World War II, in 1945, Bill became a professor of music at the University of North Carolina. A year after that he met Claire Murray on an airplane flight from New York to Boston as he was on his way to give a concert and she was returning from her job in New York City to visit her family. They were married on December 20th, 1947. In 1950 they built the first house on Old Mill Road in the Greenwood neighborhood. Newman was one of UNC's most beloved professors. He often invited as many as two hundred of his students and other faculty members to parties that were held in his backyard. All the food for these events was prepared for by the Newman's. Bill also loved teaching his students how to repair their cars and fix broken electronic equipment. When he was not teaching or performing around the country, he was usually in his garage working on his Mercedes or motorcycles, or writing one of his many books. His textbook, Understanding Music, is considered the best book on music appreciation in the English language.

William and Claire Newman home at 808 Old Mill Road, Chapel Hill

The Newmans however were not a normal Chapel Hill family. Their son, Craig, was an only child, which was highly unusual in those days, and Bill was 40 when he was born in 1952. I was a friend of Craig during his childhood and found him to be sensitive, but lacking interests in things most boys my age enjoyed like riding bicycles around town, playing sports or anything else that involved much physical activities. He also did not have much interest in the then emerging rock 'n roll music. He seemed introverted, but not really shy. He had plenty of friends and enjoyed being in the company of people his age.

Two of more than two dozen well regarded books Dr. William S. Newman of UNC wrote on music history and technique

One thing odd about the Newmans was that they seemed to exercise much less parental supervision than other parents. They allowed Craig to have things other parents would never have. For example, before he was twelve he had a real vintage World War I pistol and a military sword. As a young teenager he had adult men's magazines openly displayed in his room. This was exceptionally out of the ordinary since they were not even commonly available in Chapel Hill, and then could only be purchased by adults. Since both of his parents seemed so refined and sophisticated this was particularly bizarre. One final thing that was unusual about the Newmans was that even though they were quite polite to Craig's friends, it was the only house in Greenwood that I recall where children did not congregate or stay for very long. It was much more typical for Craig to be at someone else's house.

Jim Baucom front and Craig Newman left 1958 Chapel Hill. Jill Adams is standing in the back. 

By the time Craig was twelve he began exhibiting strange behavior, and there was a noticeable friction between him and his parents. Several of his former friends recall him hiding when his mother would come to pick him up from school, at a Boy Scout meeting, or from their house. His downward spiral seemed to start about the time he entered Guy B. Phillips Junior High School in 1964. His best friend Jim Baucom now went to Durham Academy and they rarely spent time together anymore. By the time he was 16 the only kids he was hanging out with were aimless outcasts, and he started smoking hash and marijuana which was still rather uncommon for most high school and college students. Some have speculated that Craig got into harder drugs which may have contributed to his weird behavior, but I have my doubts about this. First since Craig's only source of money was his parents, and they had strong concerns about his drug use, I doubt if he could have afforded a serious hard drug habit. He definitely was not the kind of endearing personality to whom others would give drugs for free. Finally, several people who knew him in his twenties who were wild and regular drug users have no recollection of him doing the same. Craig did graduate from UNC in 1978, but there is no evidence he ever got a job.

About the time Craig entered college his parents had a small room built for him next to the garage. This seemed strange to me then since Craig didn't seem to get along that well with his parents, and if he was going to live at home he already had a room in the house. From time to time in the 1970s he would disappear for a week or more and then reappear at home. Craig spent much of his time sitting on the rock wall across from the downtown Post Office at Franklin and Henderson Street. He did not seem very happy, and was fixated on having plastic surgery so he could look like then James Bond actor Roger Moore.

In the early 1980s there were several confrontations between Craig and his mother. In one he knocked her down in front of the NCNB bank on Franklin Street. Soon after this Craig began to threaten to kill his mother, and Dr. Newman bought a gun for their protection. Early on the afternoon of October 12, 1983 Craig had another violent confrontation with his mother. Later he began ranting in their back yard that he was going to kill her. At about 5 PM Craig tried to break into the house through the kitchen door, and Dr Newman shot him once in the chest with a .32 caliber pistol. This shot did not stop Craig, and he tried to get in through an adjacent breezeway. This time Dr Newman shot Craig in the head, and he fell mortally wounded onto their backyard. The South Orange County Rescue Squad was summoned by the Newmans before they called the Police. Claire rode in the ambulance with her son. He died at North Carolina Memorial Hospital later than evening.

Craig Newman front right next to his then best friend Jim Baucom 1964. This is a crop of the photograph Jim gave to Craig's mother several years after his death. It was taken at a boy scout jamboree in 1964. They were the two youngest members of Troop 826 which met at the University Baptist Church. Jim's father was instrumental in getting Craig into boy scouts.

Dr. Newman was originally charged with voluntary manslaughter, but those charges were dropped when the police investigation showed he did not intend to shoot Craig. No one who knew the Newmans had any doubts that on that terrible afternoon they feared for their lives and the shooting was an act of self-defense.

Claire Newman, their lawyer Steven Bernholz, and William S. Newman during the manslaughter hearing of their son Craig in 1983

Dr. Maynard Adams, UNC philosophy professor, and neighbor and friend of the Newmans for more than 30 years, gave the eulogy at the funeral. Professor Adams was one of few people in Greenwood who Craig talked to in his final years. Their conversations were usually quite deep and pertained to subjects like the meaning of life. The Newmans were both terribly sad at the funeral. Neither of them ever looked up during the service. Everyone I have spoken to who knew them say they were never the same after this. Years later Craig's boyhood friend, Jim Baucom, gave Mrs. Newman a boy scout picture of Craig and him. She thanked him but said there were so many sad memories.

Chapel Hill's musical genius William S. Newman's book on Beethoven

Looking at the facts now it is likely that Craig suffered from Asperger Syndrome which was unheard of at that time. Craig had almost all the symptoms of the disease. They include having significant difficulties in social interaction and being physicaly clumsy. As one grows older people with AS become obsessed with a single topic which they learn about in great detail, and helps them develop an above average vocabulary. They also develop repetitive routines or rituals that they follow for years. Like Craig, AS suffers have limited empathy for their peers. The exact cause of Asperger's is unknown, though it is likely genetic and not related to drug use.

The most disturbing fact about Asperger's is that by adolescence it begins manifesting itself through violent behavior. It is fairly typical that by one's teenage years one becomes noncompliant to their family members, often getting very angry, breaking things, slamming doors, and screaming. Parents and siblings of someone with AS often fear for their safety. Without learning behavior modifications and taking medications, boys with Asperger's get progressively more destructive to property, people, and pets. It is likely that Craig's early use of hash actually helped control his symptoms. One boy with the disease tried to kill his mother by putting, what he thought was, poison in her food. When she did not die, he expressed disappointment that his method had failed.

Craig had great difficulty talking to people by the age of thirteen. He also seemed to lack empathy, had poor social skills, and rarely made eye contact when talking. He would often go off into long conversations about his then favorite subject, like his desire to have plastic surgery. He also had a daily ritual of just sitting on the wall across from the downtown Post Office. Sadly people with AS, like Craig, deeply desire frienships but often give up trying because so many of their relationships fail. It seems Craig cared for his parents very much, especially his mother, but was frustrasted he could not figure out how to even be close to her.

Unfortunately for Craig and the Newmans, Asperger Syndrome was not diagnosed in the United States until 1992, so there was no way he could have gotten treatment for the malady.

Back cover of UNC Professor William S. Newman's book The History of the Sonata Idea

I would like to remember the Newmans by a performance Bill Newman gave at Hill Hall in 1955. I was six years old and he performed an incredible version of Rachmaninoff Piano Concerto No 3 in D Minor, which I later learned is the most technically demanding and difficult pieces of music to play on the piano.

by Charly Mann

There have been a long series of strange unsolved murders and mysteries in the history of Chapel Hill. Some are well known and part of the local folklore, and many have been forgotten and never adequately investigated. I will attempt to describe the facts of all of these cases over the next few years in Chapel Hill Memories.

I will begin this series with the best known of these mysteries, the total disappearance in 1833 of UNC student Peter Dromgoole and the Legend of Gimghoul Castle.  Dromgoole entered the University of North Carolina in 1831. and was known more for his interest in women and drinking than his academic achievements. The story begins with a letter Peter sent to his family in Virginia in the spring of that year telling them that he might do something that could cause them great sorrow, and that in the event that this occurred, they would probably never hear from him again. The family was alarmed at these words, and quickly dispatched Peter's uncle to Chapel Hill to talk to Peter and find out what he meant.

Gimghoul Castle  Chapel Hill,  photo 1940

When his uncle arrived there was no trace of Peter. He had vanished, and no one had any clue where he was. All that was left were a few of his clothes. His uncle talked to every student who knew Peter, as well as his professors, and no one had an explanation of what might have happened to him. He also described Peter to the drivers of all the stagecoaches that passed through Chapel Hill, and none of them had any recollection of seeing his nephew. At this point, the uncle returned home to Virginia, and the Dromgoole dissapearance went unsolved.

The modern legend says that Peter was killed in a duel, and buried somewhere near the sight of Gimghoul castle. I have discovered that this is probably true. The earliest evidence of this is the first book ever written about Chapel Hill called the Sea-Gift by Edwin W. Fuller (1847-1875) . It is a semi-autobiographical romantic novel detailing student life and a romantic relationship in Chapel Hill from 1857-1860. A critical part of the novel is a duel and the disappearance of a student much like the Droomgoole story. In the 19th century, dueling was still the way many gentlemen defended their honor or settled disputes. The practice was not condoned by the trustees of the University, and taking any part in a duel meant expulsion. It is for that reason that no student told the truth to Peter's uncle or the local authorities. Nevertheless, Carolina students knew the details of the duel, and  passed the story down to incoming students. It was only  thirty years after the event  that  Fuller heard the facts of the story when he was attending UNC.

Gimghoul Castle, Chapel Hill North Carolina

In the early 19th century enrollment at the University never exceeded 160 students, and everyone knew everyone else. In 1831, when Droomgoole came to Chapel Hill, there were very few young eligible women in town for a male students to become romantically involved with. The few young women of that age were usually the daughters of college professors. When Domgoole came to UNC there were probably six dating-age women in town, and they were almost impossible to visit or see unchaperoned. Fuller details his own experience of trying to meet young women in 1857 in his novel. Young men had to request a meeting with the young woman through her parents. If they were deemed worthy, they would be given a time to arrive at their home and be ushered into a parlor, usually with one or more other young men waiting for their few minutes to impress the young girl. When a student finally got into see the girl, she was always accompanied by at least one of her parents.

In 1893, 60 years after Peter vanished, a fellow student, and friend of his, admitted on his deathbed what had really happened. Dromgoole had had a close friend who was interested in the same girl he was. It seems that the girl liked his friend better than Peter, and this made him jealous. One day the two exchanged heated words, and after a small shoving match, Peter challenged this man to a duel.

Order of Gimghouls 1904, 22 years before the castle was built

The site for the duel was Piney Point, a favorite student gathering spot, which is now the site of Gimghoul Castle. From Piney Pont one has a gorgeous view to the East, as far Durham and Raleigh. Each man brought a second with him to the duel. Peter's was probably his roommate John Williams. Needless to say Droomgoole was mortally wounded from his rival's shot. The three other students panicked, realizing the consequences of this act, and hastily dug a grave nearby for Peter's body.

In 1889, Edward Wray Martin, William W. Davies, Shepard Bryan, Andrew Henry Patterson, and Robert Worth Bingham started a secret society at UNC using the story of Droomgoole's death and the secret cover-up as the theme of their group. It was called the Order of Dromgoole, and later changed to the Order of Gimghoul.  They built a lodge for their society on the corner of Rosemary and Boundary Street. They also expanded the story into a chivalrous legend that became part of their initiation ceremony. In 1915 they bought several hundred acres of land near the University, including the sight where the duel occurred. That land is today Battle Park, where the Forest Theater is located, which they sold to the University, the Gimghoul residential neighborhood, and the site of their castle.

It is directly behind these boulders on the left that you find the "blood-stained" rock

The castle was built in 1926 for the then huge cost then of $50,000. It resembles an 11th century English Norman castle, and was assembled by the best stone masons in North Carolina. Also built at the same time was Battle Seat, a semicircular stone bench in front of the castle that is a long time favorite spot to take dates for romantic interludes, and where one has the best view in Chapel Hill. Below it is the trail I used almost daily come and go on from my neighborhood to the castle. From there I would continue to the University or downtown.

It is probably somewhere in these woods around Gimghoul Castle where the remains of Peter Dromgoole lie

by Charly Mann

Ramses has been the mascot of the UNC Tarheels since 1924, when a ram was taken to the UNC-VMI football game. In that game the UNC kicker, Jack Merritt, rubbed his head against the ram before he attempted a crucial field goal, which won the game. After the game Merritt was labeled “The Battling Ram” Merritt, and the ram became the Tarheel mascot.

Original Ramses 1925

In 1970, I was twenty and managing a record store in Durham. I shared a small cabin between Durham and Chapel Hill on Erwin road with two Duke students, one of whom worked in my store. His name is Peter Heath. In early February, a friend of Peter’s, who was also a Duke student, turned up at our place with a surprise – the Tarheel mascot Ramses. His name was Chuck "Butch" Skinner, and he had discovered the secret location where Ramses was kept (It was at Hogan's Farm). Skinner said  that the hard part of the abduction was getting the Ram into the back seat of his Chevrolet Camaro, and then taking it over to our place. As the only Tarheel in the conspiracy, I felt a bit of disloyalty in helping hide the ram, but applauded the ingenuity and boldness of the perpetrator. Ramses stayed with us at least a week in an old tractor shed behind our house. I remember him being quite friendly, and not the least bit distressed about his abduction. I would often go out to see Ramses, and bring him grass or water. At the end of that week was the classic Duke-Carolina basketball game played at Duke’s Cameron Indoor Stadium. The day before, Skinner came back over to dye Ramses a deep rich dark Duke blue. That Saturday, February 28, Ramses was released on the floor of Cameron in his new Duke Blue colors, causing quite a commotion as the few UNC students in attendance ran out to rescue him.

This is Ramses at our place with two Duke Students, Chuck Skinner on the right, and Peter's girlfriend, Heloise, on the left 

That week was not a good one for Ramses or Carolina; Duke won the basketball game 91-83.

I have never wavered in my loyalty and love for Carolina, and just a few years later would become a member of the UNC Ram’s Club.

This is located at aproximatey 4600 Erwin Road

Addendum:
In November of 1933 bells began ringing after midnight throughout the University of North Carolina campus on the Thursday night before the UNC-Duke Football game. Awakened students were alerted that Duke students had just taken Ramses from his pen behind the Carolina Inn.

Students rushed to their automobiles throughout the campus, and more than 200 students raced toward Durham and the Duke Campus with the intent of recovering their mascot. There was a lot of yelling and honking of horns when they reached Duke, but they could not find Ramses. When they returned they were told it was all a hoax. What had actually happened was that some students had moved Ramses to a farm outside of town, and then spread the rumor of him being stolen to stimulate "college spirit". 

Click here to get  full details of the Rinaldi murder case:

http://www.chapelhillmemories.com/cat/17/125